Senior BJP leader and Deputy leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Ravi Shankar Prasad on Sunday termed Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi’s statement in an election rally in Kharsia terming the ruling BJP Government as a ‘band of thieves’ as unparliamentary, unconstitutional and highly objectionable.
He was responding to the Congress vice-president’s statement that the BJP Government is looting Chhattisgarh’s mineral resources like a band of thieves while addressing a news conference here. “Rahul Gandhi is the great grandson of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, grandson of Ms Indira Gandhi and son of Rajiv Gandhi who never used such words against the BJP,” he said.
Commenting further, Prasad said that the Congress vice-president in his election rally in Raipur spoke nothing about the scams during the UPA rule. “Rahul Gandhi had been silent on the Rs 70,000 crore Commowealth Games scam, Rs 1.76 lakh crore 2G Spectrum scam and Rs 1.86 lakh crore coal scam,” he said.
Countering the Congress vice president’s statement that unemployment had been rising in Chhattisgarh, Prasad said that a report of the Department of labour in the Union Government has put Chhattisgarh in the list with lowest level of unemployment in the country. “Rahul Gandhi says there is large level of migration of people in Chhattisgarh.The fact remains that while in year 2000 the migration number was five lakhs, it is merely 49,000 in 2013,” he said.
During the last 13 years, the population of the State also went up by 40 lakhs, Prasad said. What type of Chhattisgarh, Congress vice president would like to seeIJ Is it like the country being ruled by the UPA, he asked. On the Jeeram Ghati massacre of the Congress leaders by Maoists, Prasad asked why the NIA investigation into the episode not being completed before the Assembly polls.
The NIA report is being delayed by the Congress party to prevent internal bickering within the party, he said. While congratulating batting legend Sachin Tendulkar and eminent scientist C S R Rao for being nominated for country’s highest honour –The Bharat Ratna, Prasad said that it is unfortunate that former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee was not nominated for the honour.
“When the NDA comes to power at the Centre, we would ensure Atalji gets the honour,” he said.